No Strings Attached

Can women really be involved with someone and keep their feelings out of it?Is that really possible?
Can we have a casual relationship with a man and never really fall for them or secretly hope for more?

I won’t call you, I won’t ask any questions, I won’t ask who you went here with or who invited you there.
I’ll just be cool hanging out when it’s convenient for us both.
In return you won’t bother me about anything, you won’t invade my space, you won’t ask me who I was with or where I was last night.
We’ll go out to breakfast, lunch or dinner. We’ll go see movies and we’ll visit each other at work. I’ll meet your family and you’ll meet mine and the introduction will be that you are my friend.
You’ll cook for me and I’ll bring a bottle of wine. We’ll have little inside jokes and silly hashtags that no one gets but us.
But we won’t fall in love.
We won’t label it.
We won’t stop seeing other people and that will be OK with us both.

Bullshit.

Honestly.
Who can do that!?
Who can have all that fun and create all of those memories and then never get hurt?
Is it really something that women can do?
Can men?
Is it a self-esteem thing?
Can only super secure human beings do it?
When you see a picture of them and another female/male is on their arm but you aren’t supposed to ask who she is or where the Hell they came from – can you stand tall? Can you really not turn into the whiny, sad, crying, pitiful picture that is a distraught girlfriend?
Or wanna be girlfriend?How the Hell do you do that?
How do you spend the night with someone and then not speak to them for a few days and not care?
I mean really not care?

I think in the beginning it seems like a good idea.
Everyone gets what they need from this kind of “relationship”. Both parties have their space and their freedom; but I really don’t see how eventually it doesn’t inevitably get sticky and complicated.

Maybe we settle for that kind of no strings attached relationship after a few months.
Maybe we keep on with it because we hope that we’ll be enough for them to change their mind and want to have a real relationship with us one day.
I mean really, how can someone never, ever want a relationship, right?
I think that’s actually very wrong.
I think a lot of people are perfectly fine never being in a relationship again.
I think that as women we stay in the “I hope he really loves me one day, I think he will, he just hasn’t realized it yet” kind of relationship because we’re too afraid to face the truth.
This is another way we settle.
Instead of dropping it because we know we deserve to be truly loved.
Openly, publicly loved without any reservations.
We stay because we have fallen for him and we’re scared to let go.
What if he would really realize it soon and we’ve already given up?But what if he doesn’t?
What if this really does make him happy and feel fulfilled and he doesn’t ever need anything more?Are we really OK with that?

I’ve had a few men in my life that I felt like I would rather see them just for a minute than never at all. I would rather see them and it be awful than not see them at all. I would rather cling on to a shred of anything than completely let go.
I know how pathetic it sounds but I also know that I’m not the only one that has done it. It’s a part of my past, a part that scares me to death when I think about ever doing it again.
When I think and journal and talk it out, I know that when it happens to me it’s because I’m missing something within myself. I’m clinging on to someone else trying to fill my void, my empty space.
When I’m good, happy, not missing anything, I am the me that I want to be. I’m strong and independent and I know what I deserve and I don’t settle.Not anymore.
I know what settling looks like for me. I know what I want to have. I don’t know if I will ever find it exactly, and of course I know that as I change and get older certain things are adjusted, qualities fall off or are added. We are constantly changing, but I do know what I will put up with and what I will not long-term.
It’s in those weak moments; that’s when it gets foggy. That’s when I just want to feel cared for and it doesn’t necessarily matter what else is going on. My mind still knows that it can’t be ok. Not for long anyway. If I can see the end before it has even really began… That isn’t ok. If I have to create this false fairytale in my mind, I have to try to rid my mind of all the things that just are not good for me or I have to constantly tell myself that sometime soon things have to change. They just have to… Then it isn’t right.

I don’t know how anyone can keep their emotions hidden for long periods of time. I just know that I can’t.
Eventually I’m going to fall in love with you or I’m going to hurt or be extremely pissed off.
I won’t be able to hide those emotions forever and I don’t want to. I won’t be able to not feel them either.
If I care about someone or something everyone knows it.
That’s just me.
I can hang on. I can hang on and see where the ride takes me, I can see where we end up but I can’t pretend to not feel and I can’t not feel.
Maybe in theory it sounds great. Not wanting a relationship, not wanting to be tied down, not wanting anything more than someone to have fun with.
Fun creates memories though and memories always have emotions tied to them.